Reconnecting

Back in February I reconnected with a dear friend that I hadn't seen in about 15 years.  Marita and I taught together at Deering High School in Portland and she became part of our family when Paul and I were raising our boys.  But busy lives and moves put our friendship on pause....but we're back in business now!

The last time we got together we decided to start a creative exchange. Marita is a published poet and I'm a maker/crafter/artist so we're going to trade journals back and forth sharing our art whether it be words, images, or both.  There are no rules and we have no time frame for trading...just whenever it works. Today we made our first exchange.

Although I forgot to take a picture of my journal (can you believe that....I take pictures of everything!) I do have a photo of a little art project that was part of my first entry.  I chose a beautiful handmade book I bought at a craft fair from a local artist....and I'll share it after the next exchange. Today it went home with Marita.

I used one of my favorite familiar media..colorful images from the Gudrun's World catalog and created a recycled landscape of sorts.  I surrounded it with phrases with the word "color" in them.

I now have Marita's "Decomposition Book" (love that) where she shared a working draft of a poem that was just published in the Fall 2019 Cafe Review.  I love that it's a work in progress.....an artist's process is always fascinating.

I shared some of my creative exchange projects with Marita when she was here and it was fun going down memory lane.  There are so many ways to share art and journaling and I highly recommend it!  There are all kinds of examples scattered around on this blog and you can see some of them by clicking on the tagged labels on side menu of the blog: art journal, collaborative project, creative exchange, shared art, shared journaling.  It's a great way to connect....or reconnect with someone!